| | NOVEMBER 20238IN FOCUSIOC RENEWS AGREEMENT WITH SRI LANKAN GOVERNMENTLanka IOC, an Indian Oil Corporation local subsidiary, has been granted a new 20-year petroleum products licence by the Sri Lankan government. The first 2003 permit was set to expire in January 2024. This will let Lanka IOC to carry on with its retail business until January 22, 2044, on the indebted island nation.Aseem Bhargav, the Chief Financial Officer of LIOC, President Ranil Wickremesinghe gave the licence renewal letter to Dipak Das, the Managing Director, late last week. The petroleum products licence that Lanka IOC, the Indian Oil Corporation's local affiliate, was awarded has been extended by the government for a further twenty years."The licence enables LIOC to import, export, store, transport, distribute, sell and supply petrol diesel, heavy diesel, furnace oil, kerosene, Naphtha and other mineral petroleum including premium petrol and premium diesel". In Sri Lanka, the LIOC accounts for about 20 percent of the market share in the motor fuel sector.With no foreign exchange to import petroleum products during Sri Lanka's economic crisis, the LIOC operation became vital for the energy industry. It runs more than 200 retail locations around the island nation. The energy sector was liberalised after Sri Lanka was hit by the economic crisis. The third company to enter the retail fuel market was Sinopec of China in August. RM Parks of the USA and United Petroleum of Australia are also expected to launch soon. KKR TO FUNNEL $400 MILLION TO MALAYSIA FIRM OMS GROUPKKR, a leading global investment firm and the parent company of OMS Group (or the "Company"), a leading telecom infrastructure company and provider of subsea cable services, announced the signing of definitive agreements under which KKR will invest $400 million in a customized solution for OMS Group. This is KKR's latest digital infrastructure investment in Southeast Asia, demonstrating the firm's belief in the significance of digitalisation in the region's developing internet economy.Founded in 1988, OMS Group is a neutral provider of integrated solutions for subsea telecommunications cable services, including installation and maintenance projects. The Company maintains a more-than-three-decades track record of providing mission-critical services to clients including major subsea equipment providers, large-scale cloud service providers, and telecom companies, and is internationally accredited for its quality management system, as per economic times. Projesh Banerjea, Director, Infrastructure at KKR, said, "OMS Group has established itself as a market leader with a longstanding track record of success and growth in Southeast Asia. As demand for greater connectivity across the region continues to grow, we are delighted to work closely with Datuk Lim, Ronnie Lim, and the highly rated OMS Group team to meet this critical need. Our tailored solution for OMS Group also creates strong adjacencies with KKR's recent digital infrastructure investments and builds on long-term secular tailwinds in the region, including increased data consumption, enterprise cloud needs, a focus on digitalisation by governments, and a booming digital economy. We look forward to sharing our global network and infrastructure expertise to take OMS Group to its next stage of growth."
< Page 7 | Page 9 >